Cetacean skeletons in the world's museums

Giants on display

From the blue whale suspended at the Smithsonian to the skeleton of Old Tom at the Eden Killer Whale Museum, museums around the world hold outstanding cetacean specimens. This database lists 15 major collections and their iconic pieces.

Exceptional skeletons: a global osteological heritage

The cetacean skeletons held in museums are major scientific references for comparative morphology. The Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History in Washington holds one of the largest collections in the world. The skeleton of Hope, the blue whale suspended since 2017 in the Hintze Hall of the Natural History Museum in London, serves as an icon of marine ecology.

The skeleton of Old Tom at the Eden Killer Whale Museum (New South Wales) preserves in its teeth the wear marks of decades spent pulling whalers’ ropes, material evidence of the unique interspecific alliance between killer whales and human hunters. In France, the Muséum national d’Histoire naturelle (Paris) and the museum at Auvers-sur-Oise hold valuable series, including the Luc whale stranded in 1885.

Also worth exploring

Museums extend the science: ancestral fossils, the history of discoveries, famous cetaceans (Old Tom) and anatomical counts.